Rumsfeld: "I find it strange the laws apply to me"

Tanker Inquiry Finds Rumsfeld's Attention Was Elsewhere

By R. Jeffrey Smith
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, June 20, 2006; Page A15

The topic was the largest defense procurement scandal in recent decades, and the two investigators for the Pentagon's inspector general in Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's office on April 1, 2005, asked the secretary to raise his hand and swear to tell the truth.

Rumsfeld agreed but complained. "I find it strange," he said to the investigators, on the grounds that as a government official "the laws apply to me" anyway.

It was a bumpy start to an odd interview, as Rumsfeld cited poor memory, loose office procedures, and a general distraction with "the wars" in Iraq and Afghanistan to explain why he was unsure how his department came to nearly squander $30 billion leasing several hundred new tanker aircraft that its own experts had decided were not needed.

Then-Inspector General Joseph E. Schmitz, who resigned last year to take a job with a defense contractor, told senators at a June 2005 hearing that the transcript of Rumsfeld's interview was deleted from his 256-page report on the tanker lease scandal because Rumsfeld had not said anything relevant.

But a copy of the transcript, obtained recently by The Washington Post under the Freedom of Information Act...............

more at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/19/AR2006061901090.html

the Defense Department. Just saying. MKJ

:rofl:

Well said, BHP!

... Rumsfeld cited poor memory, loose office procedures, and a general distraction with "the wars" in Iraq and Afghanistan to explain why he was unsure how his department came to nearly squander $30 billion (yes: THIRTY BILLION DOLLARS) leasing several hundred new tanker aircraft that

**** its own experts had decided were not needed****."

"poor memory, loose office procedures, and a general distraction with "the wars" in Iraq and Afghanistan"

It's good that businesslike professionals are finally running Washington.

He's friggin SENILE! Hello?

everything, it was about to be revealed that the DOD has misplaced over a trillion dollars. Thank God SOMEONE pulled off 9-11.

night and Kos has restricted talk on his website about alternative 9/11 theories.

Coincidence, ya think???

as Kerry said on imust Change to succeed

The revolving door helps to disguise plunder and graft by agency program managers. Once they're working for contractors on the outside of DOD, NSA and CIA, they receive extremely large bonuses and stock options that contain some of these ill-gotten gains. It's just a deferred money laundering scam.

The first act of a Democratic Congress should be to audit the income of former officials who've gone through the revolving door, and trace back the sources of their income. Companies that have been found to have overcharged should see income from their stock earnings and corporate officers taxed at a 75 percent, paid into a restitution fund. That would put a quick halt to contractor overcharges and graft.

they think they are above the law, and do damn well as they please.

May I see the day in the not too distant future where the consequences of your actions catch up to you.

You have no idea just how hard and to how many deities, in order to make sure my bases are covered. I will go to my final rest with a smile upon my face as long as I am confident these murdering, torturing icons of evil are headed for their just deserts.

to feel that they are above the law.

"Rumsfeld went on to express frustration that some lawmakers responded to the scandal by blocking the promotions or new appointments of those involved."

How DARE they block promos for the guys who BLEW 30 BILLION DOLLARS?

and this issue ought to be thoroughly investigated. SOMEONE made off with the DOD's $30 billion squandered or it was used to bail out Boeing. Either way, impeach Rummy, prevent Schmitz from ever getting a defense contract and liquidate all their assets back to the US Treasury.

This is sickening. When will it end? Oh, yeah, when Rummy gets a BJ from an intern. :puke:

He uses that as an excuse, but this man still has a mind like a steel trap, and I mean that in the worst of ways. :-)

Remember Ray McGovern? He uses that excuse anytime he gets challenged, but this guy isn't as bad off as we might think. He has access to good medical care, and if he has early stages of any sort of dementia, his doctors would have noticed.

So don't buy this BS.

their actions are questioned. Libby, Rove, Rummy, the list goes on and on.

I fault the msm of this country for not making this a SCREAMING HEADLINE.

P.S. Yeah, he's senile like a fox. As far as this administration goes: let's stop making these criminals out to look like Gomer, Goober and Gabby Hayes. They know damn well what they are doing.

Do Likewise!

the quote. When asked to swear an oath he indicated he found it strange that he should have to as the law applies to him regardless whether he's sworn in or not. Just saying.

or the one that assumes some kind of good-will to the speaker.

Can't have any of that. The worst possible reading is the only one.

I took it the way you took it, and suspect the subject line of the thread is leaving out an important ellipsis.

it merely assumes Rummy is saying that which his words express - which is still highly dubious, just a little less so than 'laws don't apply to me'.

This should be the signature quote of the Bunnypants administration.

"I find it strange.. the laws apply to me."

Anway, what's with the "war distracted me" excuse? Didn't this deal go down well before the war?

Haven't we been hearing about this for several years now?

rummy was NOT saying that it's strange the laws apply to him.

he was complaining about having to raise his hand and swear in, in the grounds that he is bound by law to tell the truth whether he swears in or not.


but then again, politics is often about taking quotes out of or contrary to context....

but the tanker investigation shows serious mismanagement which he skates around.

remember. (at the fake 9/11 commission)

it was quoted properly or put in context.

:evilgrin:

They're just numbers to the morons who govern this land.........

Those, however,......are our children.....and our tax dollars...........

We have a right to be angry.....and those of you who are unconscious....might want to awaken from your long snooze....

:wow:

Now that's some chutzpah.

make me loathe every last one of them more than I do right now. I'm sure they'll come up with something though. They always do. How much more do we have to take from these fucking assholes?

This war is a corporate defense contractor's wet dream. This is just sick.

He says he finds it strange that he has "to raise his hand and swear to tell the truth" because/on the grounds that "the laws apply to me anyway".

Doesn't make sense because the law applies to everyone, yet anyone who testifies in some sort of legal investigation, has to raise his hand and swear to tell the truth.

But Rummy did not say "I find it strange the laws apply to me".

They figure they can skate on most laws but they do fear perjury.

that can be used selectively. When he wants to be, Rummy is still very sharp and is probably the most verbally skilled communicator in the Administration.

He can't plausibly claim amnesia or head injury, like several of his bosses.

http://gangstersinc.tripod.com/Gigante.html

Vincent 'Chin' Gigante was one of the weirdest and oddest gangsters out there, famous for wandering trough the streets in his bathrobe, mumbling and talking to himself for over 30 years. People said the ex boxer just took one punch to the head too many and was clearly losing his sanity. But like all acts this one too lost it's audience. Gigante would eventually die behind bars.


Let's hope that Rummy's act ends up the same way.

"*gasp* the law actually applies to me and my fellow higher beings in the GOP?"